From legendary short seller to god of American capital

Chapter 339 The Fire in Chinatown

Chapter 339 The Fire in Chinatown

After the design drawings were handed over, Larry smiled and took out the $5000 he had prepared beforehand.

Sullivan was a little surprised because the payment was twice as much as he was usually entitled to.

"You've overpaid, sir," Sullivan said thoughtfully, without taking the check.

Larry smiled slightly, handed the check forward again, and then explained, "This is what you deserve, Mr. Sullivan. I have no design more satisfying than the plans for the Garden of Light. It is a house for the ages."

Sullivan stared intently at Larry, his eyes seeming to hold a thousand words, but in the end, he said nothing. "Okay, thank you!"

Larry smiled as he watched the other man accept the check before saying, "Mr. Sullivan, I would like to continue working with you in the future, if possible."

Sullivan nodded. "If it's just about producing the design drawings, it won't take long. But you might need to complete the project, which will also take some time."

Larry nodded in agreement, but said nothing.

As they were about to say goodbye, Sullivan suddenly called out to Larry, "Mr. Livingston, um! If the Garden of Light project is completed, you must invite me. I want to see this groundbreaking building in person."

"No problem! It's my honor! And an honor for the times!" Larry assured him immediately.

Two days later, Larry and Matthew returned to Boston.

As soon as they stepped off the platform, the two were surprised to find that Boston seemed somewhat different now. The usually composed and calm Boston Protestants now wore expressions of worry and fear.

People walk faster unconsciously, as if they are avoiding something.

"What's wrong?" Larry asked, puzzled.

Matthew casually approached a passerby and asked, "Why do you all look so flustered? What happened here?"

The passerby sized Matthew up, staring intently at his hair, before saying, "The immigrants have gone mad! They're attacking passersby in secret. Three people have been attacked in the last two days, and several shops have been burned down—"

Larry and Matthew exchanged a glance and asked hurriedly, "How could this happen? Are you sure it was the immigrants who did it?"

"Of course!" the man replied. "A few days ago, the immigrants were saying it was unfair; they wanted that Chinese man exonerated, or they would set fires everywhere! Now, they've just acted prematurely!"

After saying that, the man left in a hurry.

Matthew looked at Larry with a puzzled expression. "Was it done by the Chinese? They acted way too early! Besides, at this time, attacking ordinary people in Boston will definitely provoke public resentment! This will only make it harder for Huang Meitang to get away with it—"

Larry frowned. Based on his understanding of the Chinese people, he knew they wouldn't act so rashly at this moment. Besides, he had already agreed with Elder Ye and Mr. Yung Wing that they would wait for the court hearing and contact Harvard Law School to rescue Huang Meitang in a fair and square manner.

How could they possibly resort to such despicable means?

There's definitely something wrong with this!

Larry thought for a moment, then said to Matthew, "Let's go find Mr. K and find out what's going on!"

The two went straight to Mr. K's convenience store flagship store at the train station. Business was as good as ever, but the hurried customers seemed more like they were stockpiling supplies.

"Is your boss here?" Matthew asked as he walked up to the counter.

The young man, who was busy calculating accounts for others, looked up and saw Larry and Matthew. He quickly stopped what he was doing and greeted them.

"Good afternoon! Mr. Livingston, Mr. Browning—our boss should be in the warehouse right now! Would you like to have a seat, and I'll have someone go find him—"

Larry waved his hand and casually said, "We can go by ourselves."

But just as they turned to leave, they saw Mr. K, accompanied by three young men, slowly approaching in a wagon pulled by two mules.

"Boss! Look who's here!" The Italian waiter behind the counter hurriedly greeted Mr. K.

Upon hearing this, Mr. K looked up and saw Larry standing at the convenience store entrance. He quickly ran over.

"Boss! What brings you back? Are you out of cigars? I'll go to Beigang myself and get you two boxes of the strongest ones!" Mr. K said with a mocking smile.

Larry didn't smile. Instead, he pulled him aside and asked, "What happened? I heard that yesterday some immigrants attacked ordinary citizens, saying they wanted to help Chinese people get away with their crimes—was it those Chinese people who did it?"

Mr. K's face also turned serious. "How is this possible? Boss! You know those Chinese are the most honest people. This time it's very strange. The ones leading the trouble are actually some random new immigrants."

"What new immigrant? Which country are they from?"

"They're not from any specific country—they're a group of recent immigrants from Europe. Apparently, they heard that the place is very unfriendly to immigrants, so they spontaneously began seeking fairness and justice—"

"This is absurd! How come I didn't know there was such a kind-hearted righteous person in this world?" Larry immediately realized that someone was up to something—

How could a new immigrant be so enthusiastic towards a complete stranger?

“You’re right, boss,” Mr. K said, clicking his tongue. “This happened two days ago, and we treated it as a joke. But just last night, some people attacked the Irish community and injured two passersby—this is what really happened today!”

Larry frowned, because this was far more complicated than he had imagined—how could a new immigrant possibly attack an Irishman? After all, more than half of Boston's police force were Irish—

This is clearly someone stirring up trouble!

"What did the police say?!" Larry asked.

"The police cordoned off Chinatown this morning—they said they were going to hunt down criminals!" Mr. K muttered.

Larry said coldly, "Isn't this ridiculous? The protest is against what these new immigrants have to do with the Chinese—"

'

Mr. K shook his head. "I really don't know, boss. The key is that this happened not long ago, and my information channels haven't fully relayed the news yet—"

The two were whispering and discussing the latest unusual situation when suddenly someone in the plaza outside shouted, "Fire! Fire!"

At this point, everyone in the convenience store, including all the customers, put down what they were holding and rushed outside to watch the spectacle.

Larry rushed outside, a bad feeling creeping into his heart. Looking up, he saw a thick column of smoke rising into the sky from the southwest, which he estimated was the location of Chinatown.

Matthew and Mr. K rushed to Larry's side. Mr. K realized what was happening as soon as he saw the location. "Is Chinatown on fire? Is someone deliberately setting it on fire?"

"Come on! Let's go take a look," Larry said sternly to the two of them.

The three of them practically ran to Chinatown, which was already surrounded by layers upon layers of onlookers.

Despite being out of breath, the three of them quickly located the source of the fire in Chinatown.

That's the processing plant for the Golden Fire Grilled Meat and Milk Tea shop, and also its flagship store.

At this moment, the raging fire had already destroyed the second floor of the curtain wall. The once bustling milk tea shop was now filled with scorching flames and crackling sounds of shattering debris.

The onlookers around Larry were buzzing with discussion: "The Irish retaliated! They sent men to burn down Chinatown!"

"Oh my God! How dare these people do this? Aren't there police? They've already banned Chinese people from stepping out of Chinatown. How can they come in and out now?"

The conversation between the two drew agreement from the other onlookers.

"It must be those damn new immigrants who specifically target Irish people."

"Chinese people aren't any better; they should all be kicked out of America!"

With similar comments all around him, Larry frowned and pushed his way forward, soon reaching the front row of the crowd.

Larry was shocked and utterly bewildered by the scene before him. Seven or eight Irishmen were smashing up the facades of Chinatown, and the store currently on fire was the flagship store of the most impressive bubble tea shop in Chinatown.

This is what's confusing and absurd: other houses were burned down at will, but this one house in Chinatown belonged to a company controlled by Kennedy.

The fire grew larger and larger, while the police stood by and did nothing.

The only consolation was that, since it was daytime, their vandalism and arson had already forced all the Chinese people in the shops to leave.

At least no one is in danger, but if the fire continues, it could cause a chain reaction of fires throughout Chinatown.

"Hey! Put out the fire! We can't let it really start!" Larry yelled at the police officer who was standing by and doing nothing.

Three policemen in gray uniforms glanced lazily at Larry, said nothing, and then turned back to chatting.

..

Instead, the Irishmen who were setting the fire heard Larry's call and glared at him fiercely, saying, "Get out of my way! This is none of your business."

Larry was so angry he laughed, thinking to himself, "What a foolish person met a foolish car—these two groups are still pretending to be on the same page."

"Put out the fire! That's Congressman Kennedy's property!" Larry shouted at the two groups of people with a smile.

Larry's words were like a pebble thrown into a lake, instantly creating ripples.

Both groups turned around, looking at Larry with a mixture of fear and suspicion on their faces.

"I bet you're not local cops, are you? If you don't believe me, get a local cop—see if he slaps you twice!" Larry said with a smile.

A detective in a gray uniform looked terrified and quickly pulled out a whistle, blowing it sharply. "Put out the fire! Put out the fire right now! Catch these arsonists!"

The police were shouting loudly, but instead of arresting the Irish arsonists, they were frantically searching for things to put out the fire.

The Irish who had started the fire were even more shocked. Instead of fleeing in the chaos, they joined the police in fighting the fire.

Ironically, the Chinese people who had been hiding to the side didn't step forward; they all obediently remained hidden on the street.

"Damn it, who did this?! How could they let this shop catch fire?!" The police superintendent in charge of local security rushed over, and when he saw that it was the main branch of the bubble tea shop that was on fire, his face turned pale with fright.

Then, the superintendent pulled out his whistle and began blowing it incessantly. Soon after, more and more police officers gathered around and began to extinguish the fire.

Without even waiting for firefighters to arrive, the police and the arsonist worked together to bring the fire under control.

Firefighters arrived shortly afterward. Clear water sprayed from the hoses, finally extinguishing the already small fire.

The onlookers exchanged bewildered glances, completely clueless as to what the police were up to.

The local police superintendent wore a look of constant fear. Although the fire was extinguished, the storefront of the milk tea shop's main branch was completely destroyed.

Those other idiots had no idea that this was Congressman Kennedy's flagship milk tea shop —

It's over, it's really over!

Seeing that the fire was under control, Larry smiled as he looked at the arsonists. They were all red-haired Celts, but clearly belonged to the lowest rungs of society.

None of them dared to run, so they just stayed where they were, looking at the ruins—muttering to each other about what to do.

The local police superintendent, exasperated, ordered his officers to arrest the arsonists and handcuff them together. "The Boston fire department is really efficient!" Larry said with a laugh.

After making his sarcastic remarks, Larry turned to look at Matthew and Mr. K, his face now serious.

"Something's wrong! Why aren't the police local? They must have brought in police from other cities to isolate the city from potential conflict!"

Mr. K quickly nodded and said, "You know what, it's really possible! These police officers were temporarily recruited to deal with potential conflicts."

Matthew turned to Larry, also lowering his voice, and said, "Look at the clothes of these arsonists. The most suspicious thing is that some are new and some are old. These people seem to have been hastily put together—do you know who commissioned them to come here and set fires—"

Larry nodded, and was about to discuss something with Matthew when he heard Mr. K suddenly say urgently, "Good heavens! Logan's dad is here, this is quite a show of force today—"

Larry quickly turned to look, and sure enough! Logan's father, the deputy police chief with the grooved nose, was already jogging over.

As he approached, he looked at the burned-down Chinese bubble tea shop in Chinatown, his face filled with regret and a hint of anger.

"Who the hell did this?" the deputy director shouted.

"It was us—we thought this was a Chinese shop—" one of the arsonists whispered.

Logan's father wasn't as foolish as those three policemen. He quickly raised his voice to drown them out, "Regardless of whether it's a Chinese house or not! You dare to set fire to it, you will be punished by law! Men, take them all away!"

The absurd farce was drawing to a close, but Larry couldn't laugh. The situation in Boston was far more complicated than he had imagined.